As violence declines in Baghdad, the leading Democratic presidential candidates are undertaking a new and challenging balancing act on Iraq: acknowledging that success, trying to shift the focus to the lack of political progress there, and highlighting more domestic concerns like health care and the economy.

....Lately, as the killing in Baghdad and other areas has declined, the Democratic candidates have been dwelling less on the results of the troop escalation than on the lack of new government accords in Iraq — a tonal shift from last summer and fall when American military commanders were preparing to testify before Congress asking for more time to allow the surge to show results.

"Tonal shift"??? WTF???

Let me consult my handy dandy decoder ring...

Yep...that's what I thought - the message has been consistent, so he is left floundering for any aspersion to cast, and anything he can get grubby little mitts on will do.

A “tonal shift” is what the M$M has to resort to accusing Democratic candidates of when they can’t be accuse them of flip-flopping.

It’s an attempt to make the consistency they have indignantly demanded from Democrats for all these years sound like it's a bad thing.

And let's just remember who the hell is penning this garbage, while we are at it.

Not one word he writes should be taken seriously - including and, the, and of. He isn't a reporter. He's a gossip columnist, not even rising to the level of Dowd - and we all know what I think about that petulant, cloying and vapid embarrassment to redheads everywhere.

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